Canticle, One against the Crucible
by Spunkz the wacked out Spaz
Summary: While chasing a man in Knockturn Alley, Harry befriends a young prostitute pimped by her father for money. A severe accident leaves Snape in a coma and the new Potions Master isn't all he seems to be....
1. Knockturn Alley and those within

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns most of the charas. Simon and Garfunkel own the rights to Scarborough Fair/Canticle, which is the song at the beginning of the fic. I own Karianne.  
  
Note: I just thought that Scarborough Fair/Canticle was fitting for what this story is about. Anyone who has heard it will (hopefully) know what I mean.  
  
Note: Claustroanthropophobia does actually exist. You won't find it in a dictionary, but it's a fear of crowds of people in small places. A mix between claustrophobia and anthropophobia (fear of people) but neither on its own. I myself suffer from claustroanthropophobia. So now you know.  
  
Note: Unfortunately this is based on true accounts on men whoring their daughters as sex slaves. Call me a sick bitch if you want, but just remember that it happens.  
  
-  
  
"Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme,  
  
(Washed is the ground with so many tears)  
  
Between the salt water and the sea strand  
  
(A soldier cleans and polishes a gun)  
  
Then she'll be a true love of mine.  
  
Tell her to reap it in a sickle of leather  
  
(War bellows, blazing in scarlet battalions)  
  
Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme  
  
(Generals order their soldiers to kill)  
  
And to gather it all in a bunch of heather  
  
(And to fight for a cause they've long ago forgotten)  
  
Then she'll be a true love of mine.  
  
~ Scarborough Fair/Canticle.  
  
-  
  
Harry Potter separated from his group of friends in Diagon Alley, heading off towards the darker recesses of Dizgraze and Knockturn Alley. He had seen a shadowy figure disappear down that way, and even in the crowded street it was vaguely recognisable.  
  
He had informed Ron, Hermione and Ginny where he was going. They, too, were pushing their way through the crowds though with not as much energy as he, for Ginny suffered from Claustroanthropophobia and was holding them up slightly.  
  
Pausing slightly to allow them to catch up, Harry again scanned the crowds for the man he swore he knew.  
  
He was just disappearing amongst the crowds, slipping off down the side roads to Knockturn Alley. Regardless of his friends, Harry set off alone.  
  
He knew that if he waited any longer then his quarry would get away and the whole effort would be wasted, and he could always meet up with them later.  
  
He squeezed through and down the thin back-alley, and the man's robes whipped round the corner at the other end.  
  
Harry dodged the numerous traders along the street sides, ignoring their offers of poisonous candles and human fingers. The man he needed to get to was moving too fast for him.  
  
Suddenly his quarry stopped dead. Harry paused behind a wall as the man looked round quickly. Then he disapparated.  
  
Harry cursed silently. All his efforts to catch up with the man had gone unheeded by the Fates, and he now realised he was lost in unfamiliar territory. He had only dared enter Knockturn Alley before in his second year, and that had been by accident. He had no idea which way to turn.  
  
He took a vague left, ignoring the whispering and the occasional shouts and hisses coming from either side of him.  
  
Suddenly a hand grabbed his arm and he whipped out his wand, ready to curse his attacker.  
  
"Holy geez!" said a voice, almost as dirty as the pavement Harry stood on. "Put that away, feller! I weren't cursin' yew, I was offerin' yew a bargain!"  
  
Harry looked round. A lanky, stringy man stood, half in the shadow of a derelict old building. He was looking round furtively, and was slightly stooped as though offering something confidential.  
  
"Are yew lookin' fer a good time, feller?" He asked, crystals of light reflecting in his hair. Harry looked straight into eyes that held eternity.  
  
"Why?"  
  
"I was offerin' yew my daughter."  
  
He dragged a girl of about 16 out of the shadows. She was vaguely attractive in that way that nearly all teenagers are, but she was quite obviously a whore. Everything from the clothes and the make up to the collar she wore said so. Harry stared at her for a while but she kept her gaze stubbornly on the ground.  
  
"So? What d'ya say? 10Galleons for an hour, and that's cheap compared to the other sluts round here."  
  
Harry didn't take his eyes off the girl, who looked up after her father stated the pay rate. He couldn't read the emotions in her eyes, though fear was present and her breathing was deep and shaky.  
  
Still staring at the girl he placed some change in the man's hand.  
  
"Take this as a deposit." He stated curtly. The man's eyes lit up.  
  
"Just bring her back when you wish, sir." He whispered almost malevolently. Barely noticeable to an average human was the lapse from "feller" to "sir". It seemed that anyone who wanted to have sex with his daughter was aristocracy to this man.  
  
The girl gave a frightened glance at her father, who nodded briskly before disappearing into the shadows.  
  
"Do you know the way to Diagon Alley?" Harry asked her. She nodded silently and inclined her head down one of the many twisting roads before setting off at a run. Harry followed her.  
  
They followed alleys that twisted like snakes, left, right, sometimes doubling back on themselves. A niggling thought in Harry's head told him that he had definitely not come this way, maybe the girl was leading him astray?  
  
But, just as these thoughts really began to register, they burst into the welcoming atmosphere of Diagon Alley and the sight of Ron, Hermione and Ginny sitting at a table outside the coffee shop.  
  
"Harry!" Hermione said in surprise. "Where have you been? We were looking ages for you!"  
  
"You didn't look for very long, did you?" Harry asked, eying the table with empty glasses littering it.  
  
"Sorry, mate, we thought you'd find us. We assumed you'd gone down Knockturn Alley, and none of us knows the way. And who's that?"  
  
Harry had momentarily forgotten the girl who had helped him out of Kockturn Alley. She was standing meekly behind him.  
  
"Hang on," said Ginny, pulling two empty chairs from the table adjacent to them. "Sit down and have a drink."  
  
"Thanks." Said Harry, sitting down and resting his aching feet. He motioned for the girl to sit too, and she did hesitantly.  
  
"Why don't you introduce yourself?" He asked kindly. She looked at the assembly of faces. Ron slapped his forehead.  
  
"Of course! Drinks! What do you want, Harry?"  
  
"I'll have a black coffee, thanks."  
  
"What about your friend?" asked Ron, writing down Harry's order on a piece of paper to take up to the bar.  
  
"Well? What do you want to drink?" Harry asked the new arrival. Her lips moved, and he had to cock his head closer to her to hear the whisper.  
  
"water, Master..."  
  
"Water, Ron." Said Harry. He frowned as Ron went off to order the drinks. "I just want to make it clear to you that you don't have to call me 'Master' because I am not regarding you as any sort of slave." He said, addressing the girl.  
  
She looked up in surprise. Ginny tactfully changed the subject.  
  
"Why don't you introduce yourself and tell us a bit about yourself?" She asked. Harry looked at her, thanking her silently, glad to be out of an uncomfortable subject pit, which looked like getting deeper.  
  
"I'm Karianne." The girl said, obviously emboldened by Harry's confirmation that he didn't count her as a slave.  
  
"That's a nice name." Hermione said almost automatically. "What do you do? How old are you? I haven't seen you at Hogwarts before..."  
  
Karianne went red and looked at the floor again.  
  
"I'm sixteen," she mumbled. "I'm a prostitute. My father sells me to get money so we can live."  
  
Ginny accidentally knocked her glass and had to stoop to catch it and stop it from smashing on the pavement. Hermione was staring open mouthed at Karianne. Harry was nodding sadly.  
  
"Her father sold her to me, at 10 Galleons an hour." He said sorrowfully.  
  
Ron sauntered back, balancing a tray of drinks on his hand. He set the glasses down in front of their respective owner, having ordered another round for himself, Hermione and Ginny.  
  
"Well? What have I missed?" He asked.  
  
"This is Karianne." Harry said, introducing the girl. "She's sixteen. She was just telling us what she did for a living."  
  
"Oh? And what's that, then?" asked Ron, genuinely interested.  
  
"I'm a prostitute." Karianne repeated. "I work so I can support my father."  
  
Ron blinked. Hermione gave her two Knuts worth.  
  
"Why didn't you go to Hogwarts? They would have given you food for free, help for your father and an education!"  
  
"I couldn't afford a wand." Was the reply. "I began selling sex when I was thirteen, two years after my mother died. She didn't earn much, but it was enough to keep us going. Then, after she died, we were living on scraps until I was pimped.  
  
"My father sells me as a masochist - that's why I was so submissive. I usually only get sadists interested, people who will take me away and beat me to a pulp before using me for sexual satisfaction. Are you familiar with S and M relationships?"  
  
"I've heard of them, but I'm not familiar with the concepts." Harry said, the frown on his face all too obvious in his voice.  
  
"Sadist and Masochist. Master and slave. I'm sold as a masochist, a sex slave, which means whoever buys me gets complete control. I have to do whatever they want and they dish out punishment if I go too far or hesitate."  
  
"Why?" Ron asked suddenly. Everyone looked at him. "Why do it anyway? Why agree to sacrifice all of your dignity for something you don't even want?"  
  
Karianne looked shocked.  
  
"I have to keep my father alive!"  
  
Harry appeared to have been in deep thought for a while.  
  
"I don't want to send you back to that sort of life. I have money spare. Come on, Karianne, Ollivander's is just down that way."  
  
"What are you going to do?" Karianne asked. Harry flipped some coins onto the table, and a little extra as a tip.  
  
"I'm going to give you another chance. I'm going to buy you a wand." 


	2. Controlling and Controlled

Lupin was walking in the forest. He had given up looking for Snape, who had disappeared some days earlier. The man had stormed off to his rooms and never returned, not even when Dumbledore called him through the fire.  
  
After a frantic hour or so fruitless searching, Dumbledore had given up, saying that the disagreeable Potions Master had probably gone somewhere private for a rethink about his life.  
  
A noise in front of him snapped him out of his reverie of thoughts. Something was rustling in the bushes. It was probably some small rodent, Lupin thought, hardly giving it regard.  
  
A cloaked man walked calmly out from behind the bushes, startling the werewolf. It wasn't just the fact that he hadn't been able to smell the man; it was the stranger's apparent ease with being in a forest full of dangerous magical creatures.  
  
Lupin stopped dead, his wand half drawn. The stranger took a ragged breath.  
  
"I wouldn't draw that if I were you." He said in a voice more hoarse than Lupin's after a full moon. Something silver glinted in his neck.  
  
"Why not?" Lupin asked, managing to keep his voice from shaking too much.  
  
"You don't want me to hurt your friend, do you?" the rasping voice answered. A scarred hand protruded from the cloak and beckoned a second figure out of the bushes.  
  
"Severus?" Lupin cried in disbelief. The Potions Master pointed a metal object directly at the werewolf's chest.  
  
"This is a gun." The cloaked man said offhandedly. "If he shoots it, it will kill you, and you will die a very messy death. It's an amazing Muggle invention if I may say so. The wound in your chest where the metal ammunition enters will be very small and precise, but unless it gets lodged somewhere in your ribcage it will tear your back apart when it exits. You must respect these Muggles for their devices of death."  
  
Lupin swallowed. Snape's eyes were hard and cold, nothing like the usual black tunnels of hidden emotion. He looked back into the other man's eyes. It was like looking into the world. He felt if he asked those eyes the secret to world peace, they would know the answer.  
  
Looking deeper, Lupin saw something else there. He saw, lurking in and among the amazing knowledge and cruel wisdom some remnants of dark pits, with strings of emotions attached to them. It gave him the feeling of diving into a bottomless pool.  
  
"What have you done to Severus?" He asked, barely keeping suppressed anger from his voice. The gun was still pointed straight at his chest, though Snape was not moving or responding to anything around him.  
  
"Done? I have barely done anything to him. As you will see, he is unharmed. But he can drop dead at my orders. I advise you not to interfere."  
  
With reflexes born from the curse he bore, Lupin leapt at the man, snarling. He jerked in surprise and Snape jerked also, which is why the single shot that was fired went through Lupin's leg instead of his chest.  
  
Lupin fell to the floor, groaning. The pain in his leg was abominable, though his limb possibly looked worse than it felt. True to the man's word, the hole where the bullet had entered was tiny and accurate, yet the back of his leg... muscle was showing, blood spattered everywhere, flesh mixed with skin in some torn mutant horror.  
  
Semi - conscious, Lupin looked up at Snape. The Potions Master seemed unaware of the awful injury he had just inflicted on his colleague. The blank, cold eyes were focused on some point above Lupin's head.  
  
Lupin painstakingly pushed himself to his feet and pulled out his wand. A flare of panic mingled among the gloating happiness of the cloaked man's eyes of infinity.  
  
Sharpened edges became blurred and the figure seemed to melt into the air around him. At that precise moment, Snape gave a strangled cry and fell backwards to the ground, the gun skittering across the floor.  
  
"Severus!" Lupin cried again, limping over to the fallen man and checking frantically for a pulse. To his immense relief, the Potions Master was not dead. He was motionless, hardly breathing with a slightly parted mouth. The rises and falls of his chest were much more laboured than should usually be.  
  
"Severus?" Lupin tried again, anxiously patting the man on the cheeks. No response issued from Snape. Lupin gazed around, unseeing into the forest before getting up almost in a daze, hoisting Snape over his shoulder and staggering back towards the school, dragging his useless leg along behind him and leaving a trail of blood.  
  
Behind him a single pair of eyes danced in the shadows, as their quarry grew fainter in the outline of the sun.  
  
Lupin stumbled under Snape's weight, making his slow way up to the castle, tripping on tree roots and stepping in puddles from the morning's dew. Although he never once stopped or hesitated, the building in front of him seemed to be getting no closer, and he was rapidly tiring.  
  
Hagrid's cabin loomed into Lupin's line of vision, and he altered his course to there, knowing he would never make it to the main school. He fell against the door, Snape's lifeless body falling on top of him yet making no move or sound.  
  
"Who's there?" Hagrid's voice called out from within the hut. Lupin found his mouth so dry that he could barely make any noise. He tried for a hoarse, raking bark but turned it into a howl as the limp form draped across him slid down onto his torn leg.  
  
The door opened and Lupin, losing his only means of support, toppled into the cabin, Snape's prone form rolling unresisting off him and down the steps. The hazy form of Hagrid swum into view above his head. Lupin knew he was losing a lot of blood and had to get medical attention. His dry throat did not permit him to speak, but he attempted mouthing to Hagrid.  
  
Hagrid seemed to understand the urgency of the situation, if nothing else.  
  
"Hang on in there, Professor, I'll get you to the hospital wing!" He grunted. "You're gonna be ok."  
  
The pain from his leg was now overwhelming. Some ironic part of his brain told him that if he had stayed in the forest with Snape it would be reduced to a dull throbbing by now, but his prolonged strain and activity had taken its toll on the wound, which was worse than it had been.  
  
He registered what had just been said and realised, with a great amount of relief, that Hagrid had both he and Snape in his formidable arms and was taking them up to the castle.  
  
Vision swimming, Lupin gratefully passed into unconsciousness, clutching his wand tightly in his hand. 


End file.
